


Mac and Dennis Go to a Toga Party

by Hollyhockgirl



Category: It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia
Genre: Alternate Universe - College/University, Eating Disorders, M/M, Misogyny, These two are idiots and they're stubborn and they're in love and it's frustrating, canon-typical horribleness, compulsory heterosexuality, dennis is a bastard man, hemegonic masculinity, horrible treatment of women, i do not condone any actions or behavior presented in the story
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-05-27
Updated: 2017-05-27
Packaged: 2018-11-05 10:41:06
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 9,204
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11011791
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Hollyhockgirl/pseuds/Hollyhockgirl
Summary: Just what it says on the tin. Dennis invites Mac to his frat's toga party. They try to pick up some chicks and make major life decisions.





	Mac and Dennis Go to a Toga Party

**Author's Note:**

  * For [cannonarchy](https://archiveofourown.org/users/cannonarchy/gifts).



CHAPTER ONE

 

October 3, 1997  
Friday  
Philadelphia, PA 

 

Mac was pretty sure that Dennis was wasted when he invited him to his frat’s toga party, but he really didn’t care. He was going to take it as a genuine invitation and go anyway. A week earlier, Mac had been fired from his third job in five months and his mother had refused to hire him at the Jiffy Lube she managed for the hundredth time. Mac needed to blow off some steam and a rager was the perfect venue. So Mac spent twelve hours convincing Charlie that no one would give him a wedgie if he came, stole his mothers car, a rusted yellow 1973 Buick LeSabre, and made the drive to Dennis’s frat house just outside of the University of Pennsylvania’s campus. 

Mac and Dennis had become fast friends at St. Joseph’s Preparatory School. They would often skip classes with Charlie and hang out under the bleachers and smoke weed and drink liquor that Dennis stole from his parents cabinet. Eventually the relationship progressed to hanging out after school, going to each other’s houses or sneaking into movies. One day in Junior Year Mac and Dennis were hanging out in the green Range Rover that Dennis had gotten for his sixteenth birthday, passing a bottle of Jack Daniel’s between them and listening to Nine Inch Nails. Dennis was singing along to “Hurt” softly under his breath, his cheeks starting to redden from the alcohol and the setting sun’s light hit the curls of his hair. Looking over at him, Mac found it hard to breath and his heart felt like it was encased in a hot clamp. The thought came to him that Dennis was his best friend. Mac had always considered Charlie his best friend, his sidekick, and the epiphany shocked him. He couldn’t blame the sentiment on the alcohol, because it was the truth. For a while he justified it by telling himself that a dude could definitely have more than one best friend, but the feelings he had for Charlie and Dennis were completely different, so he really had no idea what was going on. 

The knowledge that Dennis was his best friend made Mac desire to hold onto the relationship even stronger. Graduation and Dennis’s announcement that he was going to college, while Mac was not, had scared him, but Dennis quickly had reassured him that he wasn’t leaving Philly. They made plans to have a weekly movie night and a monthly dinner to be certain they spent time with each other and kept their friendship strong. Dennis had taken a psychology class in high school as a social science credit and he related to Mac that his teacher had once said that in order for a relationship for flourish “you need to set aside a special time to spend time together, just the two of you.” Mac loved the idea and readily agreed. 

Throughout the three years that Dennis had been at UPENN, the traditional weekly movie nights and monthly dinners had gone off without a hitch. That was until a month ago when Dennis hadn’t shown up at the restaurant for dinner. Mac had waited for five hours before all the worst-case scenarios he cooked up in his head freaked him out and he went home to call every number he had that could possibly tell him where Dennis was. No one answered at the Reynolds family home or Dennis’s frat house, Dee was still in the mental hospital, Charlie hadn’t heard from Dennis in a couple months, no one knew anything at the Police Departments or the Morgues he called. Finally, at around two in the morning, his eyes watery with worry, he began calling hospitals. At the third one Mac called he got an answer. 

Dennis had been admitted to the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania earlier that day after collapsing while walking to class after having not eaten for four days. The receptionist that Mac talked to told him in no uncertain terms that he was not allowed to come to the hospital at three in the morning, which led to Mac yelling at her for a half an hour. He finally told her he did not like her attitude and slammed the phone down. 

After having not slept and thoroughly cleaned the kitchen, living room and his bedroom, Mac arrived at the hospital at eight in the morning. He was given a visitor’s pass and directions to Dennis’s room, quickly finding it. Dennis was laying in the middle of a large hospital bed with a bandage covering several stitches on the side of his forehead, a black eye and his arm attached to an IV drip. He was surrounded by doctors talking to him in stern, serious tones and holding stacks of pamphlets. Mac didn’t see Mr. or Mrs. Reynolds anywhere. Just by seeing that Dennis was alive, Mac felt all the anxiety of the past twelve hours leave his body and an uncontrollable grin appeared. 

Dennis noticed Mac standing in the doorway and looked at him in bewilderment, his eyebrows shooting up his forehead and his mouth hanging slightly open. His shock that Mac had come to visit him didn’t pass quickly but he was able to quickly school his features into a mixture of embarrassment and exasperation at his personal inconvenience. He pretended that instead of a sick failure of a college student confined to a hospital bed he was a king and the doctors were his submissive subjects. 

Mac made his way inside the room and sat down in an uncomfortable, lumpy seat in the far corner of the room. He tried to listen to what the doctors were saying to Dennis, but you can only hear the words “Anorexia” so much before it begins to harsh your mellow and Mac tuned out. Also the doctors were total nerds and kept using words that Mac didn’t know and that made him feel stupid. He had started to doze off when the doctors left.  
“Mac, what are you doing here?” Dennis called out in a suspicious, accusatory tone. 

“Making sure you hadn’t died, dude,” Mac said with an overtly casual shrug of his shoulders. He made his way over to sit at the foot of the hospital bed and pulled an apple out of his jeans pocket. “Here, I brought this for you,” he continued, holding it out to his friend. 

“An apple? What the hell for?” questioned Dennis. 

“ So you can eat and be like healthy and shit.” 

Dennis groaned and leaned his head back on the pillow, “ Is this what it’s going to be like? Mac, I already have one doctor nagging me. I don’t need another one.” 

“ Just eat it,” Mac prodded, before his eyes widened and he snatched the apple back, “Oh, shit, I almost forgot. Apple skins are, like, loaded with toxins and chemicals and shit, so they’re definitely not healthy at all.” He pulled a penknife out of his back pocket and peeled the apple before handing it back to Dennis. 

Dennis ate all of the skinless apple, complaining all the while and treating it like a major inconvenience. The two played poker, watched The Simpsons and talked until Dennis was discharged at seven that night. Mac drove Dennis back to the frat house. He had been the only one who visited Dennis while he was in the hospital. 

Mac called Dennis daily for the first week after the Hospital Incident to check in and make sure he was doing well. It was a great anxiety reducer. After the first week Dennis began to call every night on his own volition. He said that it was to get Mac to stop calling him, but Mac didn’t quite believe him for some reason. They decided to forgo the movie nights and monthly dinners for the time being, because Mac wanted to give Dennis the space to heal and have time to himself. While the monthly dinner would be a good opportunity for Mac to make sure Dennis was eating properly, he also thought that putting Dennis in a food-related situation like that, with so much around, maybe wouldn’t be such a hot idea. In Mac’s opinion, he needed to take baby steps. Dennis had done that passive, ice-y thing he does when he gets mad, when Mac informed him they needed to take a break from the monthly dinners and movie nights, but had agreed. Dennis hadn’t called the following day, so Mac had to, but things soon returned to normal.

So when Dennis drunkenly invited Mac to the toga party a month later, Mac had quickly agreed, even almost agreeing before Dennis had gotten the words out. Mac was man enough and secure enough in his feelings to admit that he had missed Dennis. While the phone calls had helped, it had sucked not being able to physically see him and spend time with him. But now with the invitation, the thought that Mac was going to be able to see Dennis again was all he could think about. There was nothing gay about that.

Pulling into the parking lot behind the Delta Omega Lambda frat house, Mac nicked another car, a silver Volvo. 

“That would have never happened if I had been driving, dude,” Charlie said from the passenger seat. 

Mac looked around for any witnesses and after having not found any, backed up away from the Volvo and parked right beside it. After turning off the ignition, Mac pulled down the car mirror and checked his appearance. Though he would never admit this if you asked him, Mac had never been to a frat party before, but he had seen enough comedies to know they were swarming with chicks. He wanted to look good for them and maybe get laid. If Dennis noticed that Mac looked good, well that was just a bonus. 

“Can you smell my cologne?” asked Mac, sniffing at the air and trying to smell himself. 

Charlie snorted, “The, like, twenty different kinds you put on? Yeah, yeah, I can smell them.” 

“It was three,” Mac corrected in a small voice as a blush crept over his cheeks. 

The two friends got out of the Buick LeSabre, forgetting to lock the doors behind them. 

“ Look, dude, I know you told me they wouldn’t, but like, can I be honest for a second? I’m still worried they’re going to give me a wedgie.” Charlie revealed. 

Mac rolled his eyes, “Dude, if you act like a dick, yeah, they’re going to give you a wedgie, but just, like, play it cool and they’ll be cool, y’know?” 

“ I got it, yeah.” 

“ Because, dude, I gotta tell ya, I don’t want you to embarrass me in there.” 

Charlie stopped dead in his tracks and pointed at his chest, “Me? Embarrass you? In there?” he exclaimed. 

“ Just play it cool, please?” Mac said in a placating tone.

“When have I ever embarrassed you?”demanded Charlie. 

“Scott O’Leary’s party Senior Year.” 

“That’s on you, man. That one’s all you. “ 

“What?”  
“ You were the one who handed me the zippo lighter and the febreze. What else was I supposed to do? ” 

“The opposite. The complete opposite of what happened.” 

Charlie held up his hands in a sign of surrender. ‘Well, all I’m saying is if you hand me a zippo lighter and febreze you get what you pay for. These douchebags better not have any of that jawn.” 

“Oh, Goddammit Charlie,” whined Mac, “I just- I want them to like me. These are going to be pretty cool guys and I want them to think I’m cool. Can you just be cool? Be cool. Please.”  
Charlie rolled his eyes, “I’ll be cool.” 

The two friends continued to bicker to the front door of Delta Omega Lambda’s house. At the top of the sidewalk that led to the house were two lion statues standing guard. The house itself was large and made up of deep dark brown wooden planks and a gabled roof. The faded green lawn was strewn with red solo cups, bikes and lawn chairs. Charlie almost tripped on a golf ball as the pair made their way across the lawn. 

Mac rapped on the door twice and a moment later it was opened by an acne-covered, weasely-looking freshman with red hair and a gangly body. 

“Hi. Mac and Charlie," Mac introduced them, ‘We’re friends of Dennis, here for the toga party.” 

The freshman looked at them dumbfoundedly for a moment before answering, “Hi. Um, sorry, the party doesn’t start for another, like, two hours.” 

“Traffic wasn’t quite the shit show we expected," replied Mac. 

“Well, all right. Come on in, guys.” 

The Freshman stepped to the side and held out his arm gesturing them in. Mac and Charlie crossed the threshold into the house. They looked around in curiosity and wonder, gazing at the entrance hall of the Delta Omega Lambda fraternity house as though it was Versailles. The two gaped and pointed things out to each other as the Freshman stared at them. 

“Wow. Hey, look at that.” 

“Dude, dude, dude, did you see this?” 

After noisily clearing his throat, the Freshman said, “I’m sorry, who are you here to see?” 

“Oh, Dennis Reynolds," Mac answered, annoyed at being interrupted in his sightseeing. 

“Dennis!” Charlie crowed. 

“Dennis Reynolds," The Freshman said to himself, his eyebrows creasing in thought for a moment, before his face lit up in recognition. “Oh! Oh, okay. I’ll go get him. Just a sec.” 

With that the Freshman turned and jogged up a flight of stairs. As soon as he was out of sight Mac and Charlie turned to each other. 

“How long do you think we got?” Mac whispered. 

“ A minute. Three at the most,” answered Charlie. 

“Okay, grab as much shit as you can," Mac ordered. 

The pair began to rush around the lobby, grabbing knick knacks and other objects to take with them. The smaller things they stuffed in their pockets. Charlie threw about twenty strands of Mardi Gras beads over his head. Mac had three ashtrays and a can of Comet in the inside pocket of his denim jacket. The larger booty, such as a singing Fish and a globe, they formed a pile with on a cigarette-burned chair that sat beside the door. They planned to carry the pile to the Buick after they had grabbed everything they wanted. 

“Mac! Mac! Come here. Help me out will ya! I can’t get it,” Charlie called out, standing on a chair and trying to get a large mirror off the wall. 

“No problem, bro,” He said, walking over and standing on his own chair.

The friends began to tug and pull at the mirror, but it wouldn’t budge. They heaved and huffed and pulled in different spots. Both of them put a foot on the wall, leaving dirty shoe prints, for better leverage. Nothing made a difference.

“Goddammit. Did they super glue this on?” Charlie yelled, starting to get frustrated.. 

“Charlie, Charlie, bro. I think- I think I overestimated my muscles. I’m not strong enough, bro,” admitted Mac. 

From behind the pair, came a cough and the sound of a throat clearing. Mac and Charlie slowly turned around with their hands in the air. Standing in the middle of the foyer was a handsome black young man, arms crossed over his chest and foot tapping impatiently on the carpet. 

“ Can I help you?” he said in a terse manner. 

Mac and Charlie’s mouths opened like codfish, trying to speak, but no sound coming out. Both of their minds whirling, trying to come up with an excuse. 

“Hey, guys. What the hell’s going on?” 

Dennis’s voice was heard before he was seen. A split second later he stepped off the stairs and seemed to glide into the room. He was wearing a gray Delta Omega Lambda sweatshirt and light high-waisted jeans. His curls looked freshly combed. 

The young man turned to Dennis. “Are they friends of yours?” he inquired in an accusatory tone. 

Dennis shrugged, “I mean, I guess- more acquaintances, really. But…yeah, they’re here with me, if-if- that’s what you mean.” 

“Yeah, that’s what I mean. They were trying to steal a mirror.” 

Dennis burst out laughing, “What? A mirror? A mirror? What kind of sick freak steals a mirror? A sick freak does that. And a mirror from a place they were invited into out of the goodness of their best friend’s heart?” 

Through the peals of laughter he shot Mac and Charlie a stern, disciplinary glare and the pair quickly schooled their features into a chastened look. 

The young man laughed with Dennis, before issuing a steely warning, “Make sure you keep an eye on them, Reynolds.” 

Dennis nodded, “Yes, sir.” 

Mac and Charlie issued snappy salutes, still standing on the chairs. The young man rolled his eyes and left the room. The minute he was out of sight, Dennis turned to his two friends, eyes blazing red, a vein popping out of his forehead. 

“You guys are so lucky that I have enough pull around here that I was able to talk our way out of it. That was the President. The President.” 

“No way, dude. I think you’ve got it wrong, “ Charlie interrupted. “ The President is like super old and has white hair. And he’s not black, so…” 

“The President of the Fraternity, you ass,” raved Dennis. He continued in a tone that brooked no opposition, “Now, I want everything that you pocketed on the floor. I’m going to give you two seconds to put everything on the floor or else I am going skin you alive and feed you to a spider monkey. Now hop to it.”  
Like penitent children in front of a principal, Mac and Charlie stepped up and emptied their pockets of the ill-gotten gain. 

“That’s everything, dude.” Charlie confirmed. 

Dennis stared at the pile, “ Comet, Mac? Really? Really?” With a deep exasperated sigh he gathered everything in his arms and, muttering to himself and swearing, he carried it over to a bookshelf where he dumped the loot on the empty top shelf. 

“Never embarrass me like that again," He warned, then clapping his hands together, he said, “Okay, the party doesn’t start for another two hours. Let’s go hang up in my room.” 

Mac shook his head at the emotional whiplash that came along with spending time with Dennis. It was certainly always an adventure. 

Dennis’s room was up two flights of stairs at the end of the hall. He had shared a room for the first two years, but had not gotten along well with either of his roommates. Mac had never gotten the complete story. Whenever the subject came up, Dennis’s face turned red and he only said the word “Idiot” over and over again. After that Dennis had his own room. Mac decided it was best to not bring the subject up again. 

The room was small, plain and spartanly decorated. The floor wasn’t carpeted but instead made up of loose wooden floorboards. It was painted a dull blue that had begun to chip. The western wall was slanted and a small bed was tucked underneath the slope. Dennis’s desk sat against the opposite wall and was barren except for a Fraggle Rock thermos full of cold coffee, a CD player and a picture of himself and Dee that had been taken during a ski trip to the Poconos right after she had got her back brace off. 

Charlie had launched into a story involving Schmitty and Brie Cheese, but as the three friends lounged around the bedroom, Mac and Dennis tuned him out enough that the details were fuzzy. 

“Ya got any booze?” Mac interrupted Charlie mid-sentence to ask. 

“Why do you want booze? We’re going to a party for chrissake," Snapped Dennis.

“I’m bored," groaned Mac. “And we need to pre-game. Like tail-gating before the big game.” 

“No, I don’t have any booze. I caught got with some everclear last semester and got an official warning.” 

“That sucks, bro.” 

“You can say that again.”  
“You got any glue?” questioned Charlie. 

“No!” said Dennis firmly. 

At that moment, a knock came at the door. Dennis jumped up and opened it to reveal a weedy, nerdy-looking guy in the same frat sweatshirt that Dennis was wearing. He was holding a stack of papers that he promptly handed off to Dennis. 

“Here you go, your biology midterm is all done,” informed the Nerd. 

“Alright. Nice, nice," Dennis said and pulled two twenties and a ten out of his wallet for the Nerd. 

“That’s only fifty.” 

“Good. You can do math as well as Biology. That’s important information.” 

“You promised me one hundred,” the Nerd pressed. 

“No, I didn’t promise, Calvin. You're lucky I’m even paying you anything. Now, I’ll give you a hundred for the next assignment and I won’t teabag you.” 

Dennis clapped the Nerd on the shoulder, gently pushed him out of the doorway and shut the door behind him. 

Mac chuckled, “That nerd was such a pussy. He actually thought you would pay him a hundred dollars.” 

Dennis laughed along as he jumped the papers on the desk, his eyes manically bright with mirth, “I know. What an idiot. He sure does know his science though. Hey, where are your bed sheets?” 

“What do you mean, dude?” Charlie asked. 

“Your bed sheets for the toga- Jesus Christ, did you idiots not bring bed sheets?” Dennis stalked over to his bed, tore off his sheet and threw it at Mac’s face. “Here. You can use this one. Fucking assholes who forgot a bed sheet. I’m gonna go dig up some others.” 

Dennis slammed the door louder than necessary on his way out, still cursing them out. He returned fifteen minutes later with two slightly bed sheets, that he vowed did not have cum stains on them. The next twenty minutes were trying to convince Charlie to take off his clothes and put the bed sheets on. 

“Are you crazy, dude? I’m not getting naked in public. Walking around in just a bed sheet," he swore. 

Finally, Mac and Dennis decided to give in and stopped fighting him on it. This was not really a hill they wanted to die on. Charlie agreed to wear the bed sheet over his grubby Pink Floyd t-shirt and stained jeans. 

After that, Mac tore off his denim jacket and t-shirt to put on the bed sheet over his jeans. Facing away from him, he didn’t notice Dennis stare at his naked back and shoulders. Mac had never tied a bed sheet around his body, but he found the process simple and soon enough the sheet was tied securely around him. The effectiveness of the Mac’s tying method did not seem to impress Dennis. 

“Goddammit Mac, you did it all wrong," he bit out, crossing from his perch on the window ledge to where Mac stood in the middle of the room. 

“Bullshit," Mac retorted. 

“Un-bullshit," Dennis snapped back. “Let me do it for you.” 

Dennis took a step and a step and a step. Every time Mac thought he was going to stop he took another one. He was most definitely inside Mac’s personal bubble. Their noses were almost touching. He could feel Dennis’s hot breath on his cheek. 

“You don’t need to do this," Mac said, his voice smaller than he would have liked. 

“You’re right I don’t need to. I have to. You’re completely helpless without me.” 

“If thinking that helps you sleep at night, dude.” 

Dennis reached up to Mac’s shoulder and untied the sheet. The physical touch sent an electric shock throughout Mac’s entire body. As Dennis re-tied the two men made eye contact. Mac felt like it was a game of chicken, the first one to break eye contact loses and he was nothing if not competitive. He fought to keep himself oak solid and steady, even though his insides felt like jelly. 

“There, perfect," said Dennis when he had finished tying and patted Mac’s cheek twice. With a quick pivot, he turned around and grabbed his own bed sheet off the floor. He continued, “Now I’m going to go shower and make myself presentable for the masses.” 

The sound of the door shutting behind Dennis on his way to the communal bathroom at the other end of the hall, seemed to snap Mac out his reverie. 

“Dude, that was really weird.” Charlie breathed out, staring at him in bewilderment. 

“Yeah. Yeah, it was, " Mac agreed. Looking down at his toga he realized that Dennis had tied it the same exact way he had done it the first time.

Dennis spent an hour in the bathroom showering and getting ready for the party. Bored out of their skulls, Mac and Charlie killed the time listening to a Led Zeppelin CD they found in one of Dennis’s desk drawers and fighting over whether Mac could beat up Wolverine. 

The pair were just about to come to actual blows over the debate when the door opened with a flourish and Dennis glided in. Dennis was the only one of the trio who opted to wear only the toga with nothing underneath. It fell precariously around his shoulders and landed rather high up his thighs. On his head lay a fake, plastic laurel wreath. 

“How do I look?” asked Dennis, with a flamboyant spin. 

“Like an asshole, dude,“ responded Mac with a roll of his eyes as he jumped off the bed. “Come on. The party began like yesterday.” 

With that the trio swept out of the room and made their way down to the party.

 

The toga party had begun promptly at seven-thirty when Dave Chernin, surrounded by all of the frat brothers sans Dennis who was still in the shower, chugged a twenty-four ounce bottle of coors and then smashed it against his forehead to many whoops and cheers. At that moment Bryan Swarling turned on the strobe lights and Michael Halbreich unlocked the front door.  
Like the ocean tide during a tsunami, students arrived at the frat house. The parking lot was full within twenty minutes and there was no street parking on three of the neighboring streets within forty-five minutes. Cars came and went around the house from seven-thirty to four in the morning. As soon as one pulled out another pulled in. The multitude of students that walked must be accounted for as well. So many people attended that no more than ten jokes about sardines and needing a can opener to get out were made over the course of the night. The only ones who had been invited to the party had been the frat brothers and Mac and Charlie. Everyone else had simply shown up. All of them wearing togas. 

A garbage band made up of Phi Eta Mu members played in the backyard. After two beers they sounded pretty good. Forty kegs and a hundred twelve packs of beers had been purchased. In the middle of the lawn a coed in a yellow sundress was walking around on her hands. Within half an hour of the parties start all of the dishes in the kitchen had been broken because members of the Tau Epsilon Chi Fraternity decided they wanted to use them to play a drinking version of ultimate frisbee. Brad Whitaker, Vice President of the Fraternity, juggled bowling balls in the foyer. During the course of the party eight couples broke up, two reunited and three became engaged.

After having done a keg stand, Charlie began to wander around the frat house. When he had made the rather disgusting mistake of walking in on several couples having sex when he looked into the closets and bedrooms, he decided to check out the basement situation. Charlie had never been in the basement of a frat house. 

A clique of drama and music had congregated on the steps that led to the basement to drink and socialize. A young man with a goatee and wearing a beret had a keyboard perched on his knees and was playing Pachelbel’s Canon. He was playing it rather poorly in a turgid, sentimental manner. Charlie zigzagged his way down the stairs, stopping in his tracks when he stood beside the keyboard player. He paused and listened for a moment. Suddenly, he pounced and grabbed the keyboard before anyone could react. Holding it like a baseball bat he hit it twice against the wall above the players head. Charlie then slammed it on the first step below him and jumped down, jumping up and down on the keyboard, smashing it to smithereens. Satisfied at a job well done, Charlie calmly stepped off the destroyed keyboard and handed it’s pieces back to its shell-shocked owner with a sheepish grin. Unaware of the shock he had just induced, Charlie continued on his way into the basement. 

At the top of those very stairs was a full-body mirror. A drunk coed sat cross-legged on the floor in front of it staring at herself. For no discernable reason, she was hysterically laughing, holding her stomach from the pain. Then all of a sudden she began to cry. She began to cry as hard as she had previously been laughing. Mascara streamed down her face. 

Mac had very quickly lost Dennis in the sea of people when they came down to the party. He had looked for him, jumped up and down, asked people who shook their head and said “no, they didn’t know any Dennis”. Finally, Mac had given up and did a keg stand. It would have been completely badass if he hadn’t accidentally kicked the girl who was holding his left leg up. She gave him an attitude and when Mac asked her for her phone number twenty minutes later she slapped him. 

So Mac grabbed a red plastic cup and found refuge standing beside a keg. Standing beside a keg is the only place a man could stand by himself at a frat party without looking pathetic and alone. 

“Hey, do you think this is catered? I’m starvin’” a red-headed coed asked her blonde companion as she refilled her plastic bag from the keg. 

Noticing Mac, the blonde spoke to him, “Hey! We have English 2010 together.” 

“No we don’t," Mac called out, but they had already walked away and were out of ear shot. 

The fraternities phone sat on a coffee table that was right behind the keg. Soon after the red head and blonde left, a pathetically drunk football player, actually wearing his uniform, tried to remember his mother’s phone number through tearful sobs. 

“I just want to talk to my mom!” he wailed. 

As he was telling the football player to “grow a pair” Mac caught sight of Dennis standing across the room talking to a sexy blonde. The two made eye contact and Mac waved at him. Dennis didn’t respond and turned his body so he was facing away from Mac. 

Pissed off at being ignored, Mac yelled out, “Dennis! Dennis! Yo! Dennis! Dennis!Dennis! Dennis! Dennis! Dennis! Dennis! Dennis! Dennis! Dennis! Dennis! Dennis! Dennis! Dennis!" 

Unable to overlook the bellows, Dennis said goodbye to the blonde and slowly made his through across the room through the crowd. 

“Yes, Mac. What’s the emergency?” 

Excited by the idea and buzzed on the beer, Mac spoke quickly, “Hey, hey, you know what we should do? I know what we should do. We should start a flip cup game or- hey, hey, we could play beer pong. That’s fun. That’s cool.” 

“Maybe if you weren’t being a dick you wouldn’t have to start shit to have fun.” Dennis shot back. 

“Maybe if you weren’t being a dick and you spent a little time with me I wouldn’t have to start shit. Need I remind you that you invited me here, Den,” Mac replied, his voice rising.

“Well, maybe if you stopped acting like a condom wrapper someone threw on the floor and had fun, you would have fun,” yelled Dennis. 

Mac vulgar retort and one-finger salute was interrupted by the arrival of Charlie. The front of his toga was covered in dirt and grime and he held a baseball bat. A manic gleam shone in his eyes. 

“Hey, guys, guys, guys. I found some rats in the basement,” he announced. 

“What? Why were you in the basement?” Dennis questioned. 

Charlie shrugged, “Why wouldn’t I be?”

“Fair point. Continue, " conceded Mac. 

“So I found this baseball bat and I’m gonna go and bash ‘em up real good,” Charlie said with a demonstrative swing of the bat. 

“Why in Heaven’s name would you do that?” Dennis asked exasperatedly.

“Why not? I’ve bashed rat’s before and I’m pretty good at it. I want to be a professional rat basher, but the business is like really hard to break into,” Charlie explained. “I figure I do it around these really fancy, hoity-toity types and they can get the word out about me and my skills." 

“Well, happy hunting, bro," wished Mac. 

“Yeah, dude," Charlie said, an excited smile forming on his face. 

With a manic yelp, he turned on his heels and raced off to the basement. Mac turned to Dennis to tell him a story about Dooley and a Dachshund, but Dennis’s attention had been diverted. He was staring at something, unblinkingly, across the room. 

“Hey, Mac, Mac, did you see who just came in?” Inquired Dennis. 

Mac followed where Dennis’s hand was pointing and saw two women standing in the doorway. The first was without a doubt the most gorgeous woman at the party. She was tall, nearly six feet, with a slim and willowy build that was all torso and was positively illegal in the toga. Her ashen hair was pulled into a complicated knot at the base of her neck that emphasized its resemblance to a swan. Mac seemed to remember seeing her on the cover of several different local magazines in the grocery store and wawa. 

“Oh, I guess she’s all right, if you likes tens who are models, have blonde hair and perfect breasts that will never need plastic surgery,” Mac said wryly, a bitter taste formed in his mouth. 

Dennis continued to point, “No…I mean, yes, the Hilary Pensky just came in, but look who’s beside her.” 

Mac’s shifted his eyes and they fell to the woman who had come in with Hilary Pensky. It was a short and overweight young woman with a doughy, unprepossessing face. Her hair was a mousy brown color and covered in split ends. 

Mac stared at Dennis in wide-eyed amazement,“Dude, what are you smoking? She’s a dog.” 

“It’s Agatha Lauder, the richest girl at the University. She’s worth millions.” Dennis informed him. 

“That’s quite the random trivia fact to have at the top of your head.” 

“I keep a track of those sort of things. I made a list. Now, if you’ll excuse me.” 

With that, Dennis handed his red plastic cup to Mac and made his way over to Agatha. He put on his most charming smile and struck up a conversation with her. Throughout the course of the conversation he threw in some compliments and soon the two were dancing. Agatha was an Honors Engineering student and tried to start a conversation about an article she read in Times Magazine about robotics. 

Dennis ignored the attempt at intelligent conversation and asked her a series of questions in rapid succession, “How old are you again?” “When can you get the money from your trust fund?” “How much is in it?” “How many siblings do you have?” “Do they get the same amount or do you get more?" 

After the song had finished Agatha begged off another dance, trying to be kind, but eventually called him “creepy” and disappeared into the crowd. Dennis called her a “cow” and felt better about himself. 

He began to scour the room for Mac, eventually finding him on the floor, army-crawling through the swarm of people toward the keg stand. 

“Hey, come on. Let’s get out of here. I wanna show you something!” Dennis shouted in order to be heard. 

Mac yelled back his agreement, stood up, and the two slowly wormed their way through the sea of partiers. After what seemed like hours they were able to make it upstairs and change back into civilian clothing. 

 

The Kappa Kappa Gamma house was on the other side of the campus, so it was a no-brainer for Mac and Dennis to decide to drive. After quite a long debate, Mac gave in and they took Dennis’s Range Rover. (“These are high-class girls that we need to look our best for. That means chauffeuring them around in the Chariot of the Golden God and not that moving coffin you laughingly refer to as a car,” Dennis yelled.) They made a pit stop so both of them could pee on the Ben Franklin statue, but other than that they went directly to the sorority house. 

As Dennis drove, he handed Mac the cut-out clipping of a news article.  
“Sophomore Art Student Dies Tragically in Kiln Accident, “Mac read outloud. “What has this got to with anything?” 

“Everything, Mac. It has everything to do with it,” Dennis answered and explained his plan. 

After the two friends drifted into comfortable silence. Mac watched the night scenery, straining his eyes to make out anything, for a while, until he turned to look at Dennis. 

“Hey man, can I bare my soul to you for a sec?” 

Dennis looked taken aback and embarrassed by the request, but nodded. “Sure, dude. Go for it.” 

Mac paused for a moment to work up his nerve, before taking a breath and beginning to speak, “Tonight’s been super great. I mean it. I really needed this.I had a good time. Honestly. When I told you I wasn’t having fun I was just pissed off at you ignoring me and wanted you to get pissed off. Things have not been hot for me lately. Like, I got fired from my job at the Wawa. That was okay. My boss was a total dick. But I haven’t been able to find another job and I don’t want to have to go back to dealing. Not that it wasn’t cool. I just don’t want to make a career of it. So I really needed to party and get drunk.” 

Dennis chuckled, “Yeah, you’re too sober. I’m gonna fix that shit right up.” 

He turned on the radio and distracted himself with the sound of Air Supply. 

 

“Are you sure this is going to work?” questioned Mac for the fortieth time when they had arrived at the Sorority House and Dennis unbuckled his seatbelt. 

“I have never been more positive of anything.”

“Can I give a fake name?” 

“I don’t give a shit,” Dennis snapped. 

The two got out of the Range Rover and made their way into the Kappa Kappa Gamma Sorority House. Almost as soon as they stepped into the front lobby, Mac instinctually looked for signs of a possible threat and almost kept one eye on the front door. He crossed his arms over his chest and mentally prepared himself to jump in if anything went wrong. 

Whistling a tune by Chicago and stuffing his hands in his jean pockets, Dennis made his way to the front desk in the corner of the lobby. Behind the desk sat a pretty, petite Auburn-haired Sophomore. A name plate that sat at the front of the desk, revealed her name was Candice. 

“Hi, Candice, my name’s Dane Brass. I’m here to pick up Jennie Burtka for a date,” Dennis said, flashing her his most charming and ingratiating smile. 

The girls face went through several emotions in quick succession; shock, fear, awkwardness, sadness, compassion. 

“You’re here to pick up..Jennie Burtka?” she asked. 

“Yeah. Where is she? Our reservation was for nine,” Dennis said, his tone amiable, but pressing. 

“ Just a moment, please,” Candice said. She picked up the phone and made a quick call during which she spoke in a quiet whisper and covered her mouth. 

“So is Jennie coming down?” inquired Dennis after she had hung up the phone. 

“No, no. I’m sorry. Jennie isn’t here. Her roommate is coming down,” Candice choked out, her emotions about the sad situation finally overcoming her. 

Dennis nodded and turned to wander around the lobby, whistling the Chicago tune again. Finally feeling confident enough in the charade’s success to play along, Mac hurried over to Dennis. 

“What’s wrong De-Dane? Is everything okay with your date with Jennie? Jennie, your lover?” queried Mac in the loud, theatrical voice he used when asking. 

“I don’t know. Everyone is acting really weird,” Dennis answered in-character. 

“I hope everything’s okay,” Mac replied, almost shouting. 

“Shut up. You’re going to blow this,” Dennis whispered through clenched teeth, his eyes blazing with frustration. 

“Don’t worry about it,” Mac hissed back. 

At that moment, an attractive blonde with a beach tan and a slim build, appeared in the lobby. She looked weepy and was holding a newspaper in her hand. When Candice spotted the blonde she pointed to Dennis and Mac with a sympathetic look on her face. 

The blonde walked over to them. “Hello, I’m Amy Sawyer, Jennie’s roommate.” 

Dennis shook her hand, “I’m Dane Brass from Carnegie Melon. Jennie’s fiancé. Well, fingers crossed. Don’t tell her, but I’m planning on proposing tonight.” He said, with an airy, in-love look on his face and a conspiratorial wink. 

Amy’s face fell and she led Dennis by the hand to sit on a couch. Dennis allowed their knees to touch as they sat. Mac trailed behind them like a lost puppy and sat in the corner of the couch. 

Amy took a great big breath, grabbed Dennis’s hands and spoke tremulously, “I don’t know how to say this, so I’m just going to say it. Jennie’s dead.” 

Dennis threw his head back and laughed jovially, “Oh, okay, good one. Did Jennie put you up to that? That minx. What a lively sense of humor. Where is she?” 

Holding out the newspaper to him, Amy’s eyes filled with tears, “I’m so sorry for your loss.” 

Dennis looked down at the newspaper, after a moment his face dramatically fell,” Sophomore Art Student Dies in Tragic Kiln Accident,” he read in a shell-shocked voice. 

“Dane! Your lover has tragically died. That sucks.” Mac said in what he hoped was a comforting tone, but the frustrated glance that Dennis gave him out of the corner of his eye told him it probably wasn’t. 

Amy put a comforting arm around Dennis’s shoulder, “I’m so sorry,” 

Dennis covered his face with his hands and made loud sobbing noises, “We just talked last week. She was going to make me a pot.” 

“If there’s anything I can do to help, don’t hesitate to ask.” 

Through the sobs Dennis was able to choke out, “Oh no, no, no. You’ve been so kind to me already. I really couldn’t impose anymore.” 

“Anything, anything, anything I can do.” 

Mac leaned forward to include himself in the conversation, “Tell her what you need, Dane. I’m calling you Dane because that’s your na-” He was cut off by Dennis’s elbow in his stomach. 

“Well, this is just such a shock. I don’t really want to be alone tonight,” Dennis explained. “Would you go out with me?” 

Amy smiled warmly, “Of course. I’ll go get a jacket.” 

“Oh, and can you get me a date too?” Mac asked. 

Amy nodded and started back to her dorm. Neither Mac nor Amy noticed Dennis slip the onion back into his pocket. 

 

Amy and Candice sat in the back seat of the Range Rover while Dennis and Mac got the front. (“That’s my seat.” Mac said in a deep, threatening tone when Amy tried in sit in the passenger’s seat and she acquiesced. Mac immediately decided that Amy was a rude and disrespectful person for presuming to think she could take his seat in the car.) 

As Dennis was driving and the girls started at them in awkward puzzlement, the two friends fought over what music to play. Mac wanted to listen to a Grateful Dead CD, while Dennis wanted to listen to Queen. 

“Well, I’m going to turn it off. How about that, huh Dennis,” Mac taunted, his hand hovering over the off button, after Dennis had pressed play and the sounds of “You’re My Best Friend” wafted through the car. 

“Mac, if you touch that button, I swear I’m going to cut off that hand and feed it to a crocodile.” 

Mac made a strategic retreat and Queen won. 

The argument soon turned to which bar to go to. Nothing seemed right. All of the old haunts of Mac and Dennis were either boring or had been closed for Health Code Violations. Amy and Candice both made several suggestions, which were immediately dismissed by the boys. 

“Well, maybe if you can’t decide on a bar, you could drop us back off at the Sorority House,” Amy said in an even-tempered and amiable tone that hid her inner frustration. 

Mac made Dennis swear that he would spot at the next bar they passed. 

After an hour of driving around, they had made their way into South Philly, near where Mac and Charlie lived and had grown up. The streets were made up of run-down empty buildings, strip clubs and factories, until they noticed green neon light issuing from the sign on an old, derelict building that looked like had at one point been a factory. 

“Hey, dude, dude, I think that’s a bar,” Mac said, pointing at the light. 

“Yeah, yeah, I think it is,” Dennis agreed. 

Now they had driven to the right angle to see that the sign read PADDY’S. They parked across the street from the bar and the boys got out. Dennis had forgotten to unlock the doors for Amy and Candice until he got halfway across the street, heard them yelling ‘Dane” and had to go back for them. 

A burly, muscular bouncer met them inside of Paddy’s. 

“Can I see your ID’s, please?” 

“Certainly, my good man,” Mac said enthusively. 

He was quickly handed four cards. The girls were quickly allowed through and the bouncer leveled Mac and Dennis with a threatening stare.

“William F. Buckley and Norman Mailer?” he read off. 

Mac and Dennis exchanged a look, before bursting out laughing. 

“Oh shit, I forgot we can drink legally now,” Dennis said through a chuckle. 

“I did too. How embarrassing, ” Mac laughed. “My bad. My bad,” he said to the bouncer. 

They handed the bouncer their real driver’s licenses and he reluctantly waved them through. 

“What do you think tipped him off that they were fake?” Dennis whispered to Mac as they walked past. 

“I don’t know. I thought those were like really good, like, ordinary names.” 

Paddy’s was a dimly lit, dirty dive bar with an eerie atmosphere that immediately put Mac at ease and made him feel at home. The only occupants at the moment were three employees; a middle-aged bartender whose hair was graying, the bouncer and a college-aged barmaid, and five homeless people, one of whom was asleep on the pool table. Another was having a fight with with his pet Chupacabra. 

The group took cover in a vomity-looking corner booth. Mac would not be surprised to find out that someone had been shanked while sitting at this booth. Mac and Dennis sat next to each other across the booth from Amy and Candice. The girls tried to make conversation, but nothing they said interested the boys and so they gave terse, monosyllabic answers. Candice was in the middle of a story about a semester she spent abroad in Paris when she was loudly interrupted by Mac. 

“Dennis, how many beers did you have at the party?” he exclaimed. 

“Seven,” Dennis answered. 

“Goddammit. I only had three. You’re not getting anything over me,” Mac swore and hailed the barmaid over. “Hey, hey, could I have five beers. Thanks.” 

“Could I have five as well,” added Dennis, flashing the attractive barmaid a smile. 

As soon as the beers arrived, the boys began a drinking contest. 

Ever since Chrissy Orlando’s party when Mac and Dennis played twenty consecutive games of foosball, competition had been an integral part of their relationship. Soon accusations of cheating flew with seemingly every breath, the booth’s table was flooded with beer, two beer glasses had been thrown and shattered against the wall, and threats of physical violence had been made by both sides a total of twenty-five times. Mac won. 

 

“You think your such hot shit, Dennis, but let me tell you something, you’re not. “ Crowed Mac as Dennis seethed. “You couldn’t even school me in a drinking contest. A toddler could drink you under the table. You ain’t shit and you never will be shit. Let me tell you that.” 

“I am not replying to that and you are so lucky that I am not.” Dennis bit out through gritted teeth.

The silence that fell next felt different and alerted Mac that something had changed. 

“Hey, where are the girls?” he asked. 

The two scanned the dirty bar, finding no sign of Amy and Candice.

“Goddammit, “Dennis screeched, slamming his beer glass down on the table and breaking the third one of the night. “They left. They left us.” 

After calling the girls every vulgar name and derogatory term for a woman at least twenty times, Mac and Dennis felt much better and Dennis’s face had changed from beet red to its original hue. They ordered another two beers. “The Boys Are Back In Town” played on the jukebox and the two friends sang along, using their beer bottles as microphones and squirming around on the booth seat in an approximation of dancing. 

As soon as the song ended Mac spoke to Dennis in his most serious voice, trying desperately to not let any hesitancy through. He attempted to make eye contact, but found that he couldn’t. ” Hey, Dennis I have a question…and… it kind of could be personal. I don’t know, maybe.. I don’t know…and you don’t have to answer if you-”

“Spit it out,” snapped Dennis impatiently. 

Mac blurted it out, “Are you happy at school? At college?” 

Dennis was taken off guard by the earnest question, “Happy?” he spluttered.” What even is happy? Why does that matter?” 

“Why does being happy matter?” Mac repeated.

“Okay, I will admit that there have been some missteps. Not everyone has treated the Golden God with the respect he is due. That’s on them. That has nothing to do with me. It was nothing that I couldn’t handle. Nothing that the Golden God can’t handle. The Golden God’s plans will succeed no matter how much of that asshole’s money I have to through at it. I will make it out the other end and when I stand in my mansion, with a former Playboy bunny wife and rooms full of gold, I will look back at this from on high and laugh and shove it in everyone's face. Why do you even care, Mac?” 

Mac shrugged and curled his lips into a half-smile, “ I just want you to be happy, dude.”

An unreadable emotion flickered across Dennis’s face. He curled his hands around his beer glass and stared down at it. Every know and then his eyes darted around Paddy’s to make sure no one was starting at them. “Hey man, “he started after a long pause, his voice soft and thick, “Um… I never… I just wanted…I never said… for when you visited me in the hospital.”

“No problem,” Mac replied, smiling, and cocking his head so he could try and look at Dennis’s face. 

“I wanted to. I want you to know that I…really liked that.” 

“Of course, Den, ” Mac said simply and knew that nothing else needed to be said. 

Mac thought that Dennis had finished speaking when he took a gulp of beer, but he continued in the same husky voice. “I know.. that I don’t show it, but I love you, dude. I love you with the fury of a thousand suns.” 

At first Mac thought that he had misheard or he was so drunk he was hallucinating. He reached down and pinched his wrist and when he felt the pain determined that he heard correctly. All of the sudden his mind felt terribly sober. Finally, Dennis looked up and the two men looked at each other silently, with half-smiles on their face. Each was trying to figure out what the other was thinking and feeling. Time seemed to stop and the moment stretched itself until finally Mac spoke. 

“Bro, you are so wasted right now, “he said, trying to diffuse the bomb that sat in between them. 

“No, no… I mean, yes, yes, I am, but my mind is sober right now. I meant it. Move in with me.” 

“What?” 

“I’ve been thinking about it and when I graduate in May and start Vet School, I’m going to move out of the fraternity. I’m going to get my own place. I think it would be good for you to move out too. It’s not a good situation. It’s just not. You’re miserable and you’re poor as shit so you can’t afford your own place. You’re going to end up crashing at my place all the time and sleeping on the couch, so why not just cut out all that unpleasantness and awkwardness and just move in officially. “ 

Mac waited for Dennis to start laughing and tell him he just got punk’d, but that never happened. He took a great big breath, jumped off the cliff and spoke, “ Okay. Sure, bro. Let’s move in together.” 

“Let’s move in together.” 

“Let’s move in together.” 

“Let’s move in together.” 

“Yeah!” 

The two high-fived and then slumped against the back of the booth. They drank their beer in contented silence for a moment before Dennis elbowed Mac to get his attention. 

“Hey, don’t you think owning a shit hole like this would be kind of cool?” he asked. 

“I guess, It could be fun, “Mac responded, shrugging and chugging down the rest of his alcohol. “Free beer.” 

“Yeah. Free beer. Drunk chicks. Drunk chicks!” 

“Dude, every night. If we owned a bar we’d be getting laid like every night.” 

“We would set records.” 

“I know, dude.” 

“Drunk chicks,” Dennis crowed, before getting a thoughtful expression on his face. “It would probably be shit though.” 

“Complete shit,” agreed Mac. 

“If that ever happened-I mean, look at that bartender, for christ sakes. He’s like, what, pushing forty and still tending bar. If that happened to me I would blow my brains out.” 

“Yeah, me too.” Mac said, nodding in agreement. Suddenly, he tensed up and turned to Dennis, putting his hands on the other man’s bicep. “Holy shit, dude. We forgot Charlie.” 

“We forgot Charlie.” repeated Dennis.

In a panic the two young men jumped out of the booth and raced out of Paddy’s. 

 

THE END

**Author's Note:**

> Hi! I'm so excited I was able to write this story for you, Cannonarchy. I hope you at least vaguely enjoy it. Ha! You asked for something with backstory and here you go. We have Dennis (not being a functional human being) in College. We have the beginning of the monthly dinners, movie nights, Dennis not being allowed to eat Apple skins and "Dennis loves me with the fury of a thousand suns." The two idiots decide to move in together. They go to Paddy's for the first time. Enjoy! 
> 
> Also, just a general note. I stole so much from "National Lampoon's Animal House", it's not even funny.The idea for the Toga Party, Charlie smashing the keyboard and Dennis's "Jennie Burtka scam. The Toga Party was also heavily influenced by parties in "Breakfast at Tiffany's" and "The Great Gatsby"  
> Leave a comment below and let me know what you thought!


End file.
